Cairnspeak

Keeping the Dusk at Bay

Midsummer Week 2

Young priest Vessus Claymore is sent to investigate some suspicious happenings at the Lighthouse Abbey. He stops off at the Dawnwater Inn to track down Boru, a warrior priest from the outlying farmlands, that he’s recently met as a visitor to Cairnspeak. Overhearing their exchange, the elven thief Zilmar, gambling and womanizing wizard Gredamir, and Cyrian, a warrior deluded into the belief he is a minotaur, decide to come along for the adventure.
Approaching Lighthouse Abbey, normally uninhabited save for the elderly Rector Craven, the heros find the Abbey door’s bashed in—orc raiders have intruded the Lighthouse and work feverishly to put out the light. Though they’ve sabotaged the gearworks and stopped the great lamp from turning, they cannot extinguish the light and have tried to hood it with large sacks.
The heros battle in the watery gear room, the lamp room, and even the dining hall; they sneak past a fireside group of drunken ogres and haul coal and water around the Abbey. Though Flith the Half-Ogre was defeated, the Rector could not be saved, slain before the group could arrive.
The light shone on, however, and the party watched a pirate raiding ship flee the bay far beneath their cliffside vantage.

Important info gained: A force of Orcs and Ogres has organized to attempt an marine attack on a ship or ships. This sort of aggression has not been seen since the last war.

Latesummer Week 1

Important info gained: Millgard was a member of the city guard, commanded by Lord Kuromane’s authority to use his ship to pick up a load from nearby. He swears that he did not know the cargo was bugbears and mercenaries and went into hiding subsequent to the massacre at the warehouse.

He was eventually caught and had his shadow drawn out from him in the basement of the Velvet Pouch. It slit his throat, seemed to become corporeal, and was drawn into the dark crystal. When the party returned to the site, the basement was locked and the crystal gone(?)

Claymore’s little sister Bellany was also taken by Orogs and, at the last minute, was also strippd of her shadow and drawn into a dark crystal. Boru was somehow able to shatter it.

Latesummer Week 2

Important info gained: Giobehn and his people, the Kalyzti, have some knowledge of shadows dating back to the fall of Old City. He has directed you to an abandoned Kalyzti village for knowledge of the shadows.

Living nearby is an old Kalyzti woman named Alyona, from a different clan than Giobehn. She offered the party an old stone tablet from the human barbarians prior to year 0. She also identified a sword the party found as of Kalyzti origin.

Alyona says her bloodline has the ability to see shadows and destroy them. However, she doen’t know anything about crystals.

Latesummer Week 3

Important info gained: Claymore has identified a source material for the crystals called Thrydium. It used to be mined in a since abandoned location not far from Willowdale.

Gredamir also met with the wife of Pyotr Glass, a famed mage trying to establish a magical gate linking Cairnspeak with the distant city of Galia. He had recently been discovered dead and declared a case of suicide, though those around him have their doubts.

Latesummer Week 4

Newautumn Week 1

Important info gained: a third dark crystal has been found aboard the Wave’s Grace outside Blackhill. Zilmar’s uncle Zayman, a long time rogue of the sea, has been bankrolled by “Kuromane and his pet mage Titus” to capture and sacrifice seafarers to the dark crystal. His hopes of acquiring enough plunder to pay off his debts at Fesker’s and other old town haunts was dashed by the party, who smashed him into a pulp.

After sinking the galleon and returning to Cairnspeak about Pirate Lara’s Rolling Royal, the party received Kalyzti weapons from a grateful Victor Virov—not before a freshly undead Estrid returned to exact revenge on her twin. Estrid was killed and burned.

Newautumn Week 2 (Days 1-3)

Important info gained: the Lighthouse Abbey continues to upgrade and gather reinforcements. A distracted Claymore trades a map of Uruk Kur with the request of Yvan Kuromane’s lost journal in exchange. Astor, shaken and pale since being strangled by Estrid, goes into a convulsive trance and recites this augury in the voice of another girl:
“The blood of the founder shall be the blood of the finisher.
A new sun will rise from the deep black earth after many souls drench the soil of both shores.”
She collapses, wrecked, an is unable to travel.

After the party aids a wolf against a group of evil wargs, they are led to a group of Kalyzti rangers. Victor’s nephew has been captured by orcs and is being held in the city. They note that a gray robed wizard on a flying steed has been coming and going from a manor in the north.

Kuromane’s lost journal tells of his family’s history with a joining ritual, in which they contacted a being from a “shadow realm” and offered human sacrifices in exchange to be bound with the lost shadow from the other world. Doing so would grant them enhanced powers and abilities but also inevitably drive them to madness. His notes indicate their plans to retreat to Cairnspeak and execute the ritual.

Newautumn Week 2 (Days 4-5)

Important info gained: a seventh ranger and a Kalyzti woman have joined the rangers at the designated meeting spot. She is of the bloodline of Alyona and is involved with Victor’s nephew Ryan although the patron will not sanction their union based on their differing clans. She has been using her magic to spy on the city.

A charmed half-ogre mage mentioned that a wizard named Titus is occupying the manor on the hill. He isn’t the direct leader of the city, but has been meeting with the clan leaders in Uruk Kur. There is evidence that the clans within Uruk Kur are often fighting on another.

Durk the Orog fought valiantly by the party’s side until a Mirrous (Steely Dan) Ogre split his skull in two.